Stupid Things
by Bibliotheque
Summary: Hyuuga Neji liked to be logical, and he based his feelings off of logic. After all, doing anything else would be stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things. NejiLee.


Yo. I'm writing about Neji 'cause he's awesome. It started off as just a thing about Neji and how he thought about stuff, and then it sort of...mutated into NejiLee. I'm a shounen-ai writer in the same way people are lepers. It's a disease, I swear.

Rating: Meh, PG or so for boy-love and cursing. And Neji.

Pairing: NejiLee, because...I dunno. It sprouted like a fungus.

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Sometimes Neji wondered if living even really had a point, since everything was predetermined by Fate anyway. Why try to live when your death has already been decided? Fighting against something as intangible and immovable as Fate was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

He hated Hyuuga. He hated the main family and he hated the branch family. He hated Hinata and Hanabi and Hiashi and he hated Hizashi and himself and everyone. Neji hated Hyuuga, but he would defend it with his dying breath. Hyuuga wasn't anything he loved, but it was his. Not protecting something that was yours was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

He didn't hate his team, didn't hate Lee or TenTen or even boisterous, obnoxious Gai-sensei. Sometimes he wondered why, because they were nothing like him. TenTen was cheerful and happy and believed in herself and in him and Lee, because they were Her Boys and you had to believe in what was yours. Lee was hard-working and honest and so disgustingly _nice_ that he made Neji feel slightly ill--like eating too much sugar--and he believed in himself. Gai-sensei was loud and boisterous and always moving, running and jumping and jogging and sparring but never, ever being still, because stillness was old and Gai-sensei was not old, and he believed in everything. They were different, but hating people just because they were different was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

He didn't feel much of anything towards Hinata. Hinata was weak and something of a coward, and in Neji's eyes that made her useless. She was useless and had no effect on him or his life, so he didn't care about her. He might have hated her for being main family while he was branch, but he knew well enough that she hadn't chosen to be born and, anyway, probably wished she hadn't been. He might have loved her for being his cousin and kind and sweet and accepting of him no matter how cruel he was, but Neji wasn't a loving sort of person and Hinata wasn't the type of person he got along with--not that he got along with anyone. Feeling anything towards someone or something that doesn't affect you was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

Neji didn't quite hate Naruto, but he came pretty close. Neji knew that the boy had far more power than it seemed and that he was wasting that power. Neji abhorred nothing more than wasting what you had, so he didn't like Naruto out of principle. The boy seemed to embody everything he hated--wastefulness, greediness, blatant ignorance and being purposefully difficult just to get a rise out of people--and so, naturally, Neji hated him. Or something like that. He never confronted the boy unnecessarily, though, never sought him out just for a fight. Picking fights with people for no other reason than that they annoy you was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

As much as he hated it, Neji didn't avoid going to the hospital when he needed to. Not getting his injuries treated could make him slow, and being slow could get him killed. Getting killed because of his pride would be stupid, after all, and Hyuuga Neji didn't do stupid things.

He hated it because Sakura was always there, and she almost always ended up being the one to treat him, and she would tell him to take it easy, take it slow, rest up and recover and not get so beaten up. She would ask how he got hurt and he'd gruffly tell her he'd been training, and she would know that he meant that he'd been sparring with Hiashi-sama, because Hiashi-sama was the only person capable of hurting Neji like that who would. Neji wouldn't say any more than that, wouldn't talk about _why_ Hiashi-sama hurt him so badly or why he let it happen, because that would be revealing family secrets. Revealing secrets to people who didn't need to know them was stupid, and Hyuuga Neji didn't do stupid things.

Sometimes it was Hinata who treated Neji, and that made everything worse. She stuttered and stammered and blushed and asked if he wanted her to ask Hiashi-sama to be gentler, and he stared at the floor and was stonily silent until she was done. Somewhere inside of him, he knew that Hinata was trying to help him, but Hiashi-sama was making him strong. Resisting strength would be stupid, and Hyuuga Neji didn't do stupid things.

Even though Neji pretended that everything was fine--"It's fine, we're fine, don't worry. Everything's just...fine."--between the main family head and the branch family prodigy, Sakura wasn't stupid or blind and she knew that Neji tried to hurt Hiashi-sama and Hiashi-sama always did as much damage as he could get away with. It was clear who was stronger, because _Hiashi-sama_ was never in the hospital with a broken arm and a broken leg and broken ribs or, in fact, a broken anything. Sakura sometimes wondered if Hinata knew the same thing, but when she heard the girl crying to Shino--who was always there for her, even if he was a bit creepy--that her father was going to kill Neji someday, she was certain of it. Neji didn't know anything about how Hinata cried, or how TenTen and Lee would visit him and shake their heads solemnly while he was comatose and talk in low voices about how he was going to get himself killed.

And when it was just Lee in the hospital with Neji, or in the woods with Neji, or in the Hyuuga compound with Neji, or anywhere at all with Neji, he didn't bother to keep his voice down. He told Neji quite frankly what he thought, and he thought that Neji was being a complete idiot. Neji shot back that he didn't do stupid things, and Lee--nice, sweet, _responsible_ Lee--tried very hard not to punch him. Sometimes he succeeded, sometimes he didn't. Making Lee mad was hard to do, unless you were Neji, and then you could do it just by stating the blatantly obvious truth that no one else seemed to notice. Making Lee mad on purpose was stupid, so Neji never did it, because Hyuuga Neji didn't do stupid things.

Lee got mad if someone he loved was threatened. The fact that Lee got mad at _him_ never made sense to Neji, because he was Lee's friend, which meant that Lee loved him, right? And if Lee loved him, then Lee wouldn't want to hurt him, even if it was a quick, easily-dodged punch that didn't have any heart behind it, right? Neji didn't understand until Lee explained that Neji was threatening himself, and it was his duty as Neji's friend to keep him from doing so. Neji snorted and told Lee that he was stupid.

Neji loved Lee. He didn't know exactly when he'd started loving Lee, but when someone has saved your life more times than you can count, and when you've returned the favor just as many times, and when the both of you and your teammate have all saved each other over and over again, loving them would be a pretty logical next step. Neji had always been logical, so it didn't surprise him when he realized one day--somewhere in between waking up and eating lunch, because he remembered the sounds of their training cutting through the still morning and the chilly early-morning air raising goosebumps on his exposed arm--that he loved Lee. They'd been through so much together that it made sense. Denying it would be stupid, and Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.

Logic pointed out that there was no shame in loving Lee. Hiashi-sama could sneer all he wanted, and Hinata could blush and stutter and avoid the subject until her death, and all the other main family elders could snicker and titter and tease and scorn Neji until their eyes fell out, because none of it meant anything to him. There were other branch family males, after all, ones that may not have been as smart or strong or gifted as Neji, but ones that liked _girls _and didn't fall in love with stupid nobodies from stupid, nobody families. Logic said that it didn't matter, since Hinata or Hanabi--he couldn't even remember which one of them was heiress to the main branch anymore, it had changed so many times in his life--would probably have twins, one of which would have to be born after the other, and the branch family would just have to wait a generation or so before it could be continued, if none of Neji's other cousins produced an heir. Or maybe Hinata would be branded with the seal Neji hated so much and relegated to a member of the branch family, which would probably suit her just fine.

But, really, there was no reason at all to be ashamed. Neji didn't care about the main family _or_ the branch family, and while he'd die to protect either, it didn't mean he liked them. Anyway, it was _his_ life and _his _heart and, when they got right down to it, _his_ choice to finally admit what he'd known for so long: that he wasn't, never had been, and never would be interested in girls. Being ashamed would be a stupid thing. Being embarassed when Hiashi sneered and called him effeminate, or when Hanabi--who was young enough to be influenced by father's cruelty--pretended to mistake him for Hinata, or when one of his branch family cousins called him names, or when any member of Hyuuga was unpleasant to him because of his preferences was stupid.

Laying in his bed, hands pressed over his burning face and trying so hard not to cry--Hyuugas didn't cry, men didn't cry, and, gods damn it all, _Hyuuga Neji_ didn't cry--Neji told himself all of this. He told himself that it was illogical, unreasonable, and, above all stupid. He told himself that he, Hyuuga Neji, genius and child prodigy, did not do stupid things. But that didn't stop the blood pounding in his ears or the way his face burned with shame, or the way bitter words stuck in his throat and humiliation manifested itself in big, wet tears sliding down his face, or the way he seethed inside because he knew that he was stupid and weak and pathetic and everything that he should never have been. He was being stupid, and he hated it, because no matter what else happened, _Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things_.

Lee would say that he needed to give himself a break, because no one was perfect all the time, but Lee was the whole reason Neji was holed up in his room, laying in his bed even though it was after noon and crying like a teenage girl. Lee was _stupid_ , and Neji couldn't understand--why he loved Lee, for one thing, but wondering about that would be stupid because he _did_ and that was really all that mattered--why he was so _happy_ all the time. Maybe doing stupid things made you happy. _In that case,_ Neji thought, kind of blearily--he suddenly felt hugely, enormously tired, as if he had been alive for centuries-- _maybe I'll never be happy._ And if he wished that things could be different, he didn't do it for very long. After all, wishing for things to change when they very obviously couldn't was stupid. And Hyuuga Neji did not do stupid things.


End file.
